The Lukan Jump

 No, it’s not some veiled Star Wars reference.  It has everything to do with when the Liturgical calendar of the Church begins to read Gospel lessons from the Gospel of Saint Luke.  And we find ourselves in the middle of it this week!

So let’s first look at what Gospels are read when during the Liturgical year.

Things begin with Pascha.  John 1:1 starts the cycle of Gospels for the year on the day of Pascha.  We continue to read from the Gospel of Saint John from Pascha until the Liturgy of Pentecost.

Starting with the Monday after Pentecost we begin to read from the Gospel of Saint Matthew.  His Gospel is setup for readings for up to as many as seventeen weeks from this point forward.  From the twelfth week forward, it is read on Saturdays and Sundays, while the Gospel of St. Mark is read on the weekdays.

And now comes “the Lukan Jump”!

Beginning with the Monday after the Sunday after the Feast of the Elevation of the Cross we read from the Gospel of Saint Luke.  Why the reference to “jump”?  Because the number of weeks between Pentecost and the Elevation of the Cross is dependent on the date of Pascha,  This number of weeks is different from year to year, longer when Pascha is “early”, shorter when it is “late”.  The seventeen weeks of Matthew already mentioned is the LONGEST distance possible between the Feasts.  When the calendar finds the distance shorter, gospel readings from St. Matthew are “jumped over” in deference to reading from the Gospel of St. Luke.  More on that in a moment.

Finally, with the exception of the Sunday of Orthodoxy, the Gospel of St. Mark is read during the season of the Great Fast on Saturdays and Sundays.

Based on all of the above, many people assume that the Lukan Jump is related to the Feast of the Elevation of the Cross. 

In fact, this is not the case.

The Elevation of the Cross falls on the “Fixed Calendar” of the Church, each year on September 14th.  In close proximity to this date is September 23rd, the Feast of the Conception of the Forerunner and Baptist John.  Since this event is best recorded in the Gospel of Saint Luke (Luke 3:23-4:1), we “jump” to the Gospel of Saint Luke with this Feast and continue in St. Luke until we approach the Great Fast the following spring.

On your calendars, the Sundays of the Gospel of St. Matthew are simply referred to as “The N^th Sunday After Pentecost,” with N being the number of weeks following Pentecost.

When you look at your calendars starting with September, this same numbering is retained, and it in fact dictates which Tone of the Week is to be used, and also which Epistle is to be read (there’s no “jump” for Epistles!).  But you’ll also see that beyond “Sunday N After Pentecost,” there will also be a note, “Y^th Luke”, indicating which of the nineteen gospels of Luke is to be read in any given week. 

Make sense?

Now you can wax profound with your Orthodox friends about when, where, and why the various Gospels are read throughout the Ecclesiastical year.

Glory to Jesus Christ!

The Weapon of Peace

 “But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.” (1Cor 1:23-24)

Preaching the message of our salvation in Christ has never been an easy task.  St. Paul’s words make it eminently clear that this was true in the first century, and it continues so to this very day.

The Greek word for stumbling block is skandalon, from which we derive our English word scandal. 

St. Paul explains that the Jews asked for signs because that is what the prophets gave them.  But still they didn’t believe.  Giving them a message of death by crucifixion to the One Who comes as their Savior is that scandal, for it was a shameful, unthinkable death for any human being, but pushing further to understand death for the One Who comes as God?  Totally unthinkable!  Their Messiah was (in their minds) to be exalted, not humiliated.  While we believe this as well, as Christians we understand the gulf of time between the effecting of our salvation on the Cross and the anticipated Second and Glorious Coming!

You say, “Preach to the Moslems?”  They recognize Jesus as a prophet, but their view is that the sovereignty of God would never permit His servant to suffer a shameful death, but would deliver him from any enemies.

And what of the Greeks?  St. Paul says they consider the message of the Cross to be foolishness.  Why?  Because given human logic, any god worth being called by the name has to be vastly superior to the inferior material world.  Any god who would become a mere mortal would make no sense.  Why would a god choose to take a body that must be exposed to death?  Unthinkable!  The Greek concept of eternity was via amassing knowledge sufficient to free them from the physical world, enabling them to share in a spiritual realm.

That was then.  This is now.  And what has changed?  Perhaps the “names” have—the general category of “intellectuals” would argue along the aforementioned thinking of the Greeks.  Those bounded by some form of faith that is non-Christian, Buddhist, Hindus, contemporary Jews, Baha’i, Hindus, and a long list of others have myriads of reasons to reject a god who breathes and comes to die.  And this ignores the religions that are not religions, the Deists, the Atheists, the Gnostics and others.

Only to Christians in general, and only to the Orthodox in particular, does the Cross mean life, not death.  Only to us is it an emblem of salvation, not a curse.  St. Paul expresses the division beautifully in Phil 2:5-11.  Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.  St. Cyril of Alexandria will end our discussion with the succinct explanation, He became like us that we might become like him. The work of the Spirit seeks to transform us by grace into a perfect copy of his humbling.

May we as faithful Orthodox Christians always look to the Cross of our Lord as the eternal symbol of His victory over death for all of creation, for all time, for all who will receive It in faith and love, embracing through It the salvation that He worked upon It!

It’s a glorious Feast!

The Forerunner

 It is good for us to try to learn as much as possible about a man who our Lord described as the greatest born of woman. (Luke 7:28) And so let us study St. John.

What things are important about this man beyond the manner of his martyrdom?

The first thing we’ve just touched upon—our Lord’s endorsement of his status.  Some ask, “Isn’t Jesus the greatest born of woman?”  The answer is no, because Jesus was not born of a woman (a married female) - He was born of a Virgin.  To illustrate the importance of the Forerunner inside the Church, we must recognize that there are six (6) feasts in the annual calendar dedicated to St. John.  In the calendar, his conception is commemorated on 23Sep, ‘the Synaxis’, 07Jan.  The second finding of his head is commemorated on 24Feb.  Third finding is 25May.  His nativity is celebrated on 24Jun. And his beheading is commemorated on 29Aug.

His parents Zachariah and Elizabeth are saints, great and holy people whose prayer to be released from barrenness was answered with the birth of the Forerunner.

Saint Elizabeth is the sister of Saint Anna, the mother of the Theotokos.  And so John is ‘family’ to our Lord!

St. John is also given the title of Prophet.  But this title is more than just a descriptive name.  He is the final (last) prophet in the Old Testament (that is BEFORE the coming of Christ).  And he is also the first prophet in the New Testament.  This has the Church describing him as a point of joining the two through this one man.

St. John is also the first martyr in Christ, giving his life about three years before the Protomartyr Stephen, who is known as the first martyr AFTER our Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension.

St. John is also the first to live a fully monastic life.  For this reason he remains to this day the patron saint of all monks.  We recall in the Gospel read today the young man coming to our Lord to ask what more he needs to do to inherit eternal life, and the answer is to sell all, give to the poor, and come and follow Christ.  This is the message that changed the heart of St. Anthony the Great, leading him into the desert to imitate the life of the Forerunner.

St. John’s message was simple.  Repent!  As Forerunner, his position as such was cemented in this preaching when our Lord’s first public message was identical to John’s—Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!

St. John showed no self pride.  While he had disciples, after our Lord’s coming to him for baptism, he instructed two of his own, Andrew and Peter, to go and follow Christ.

One of the cornerstones of the monastic life is obedience.  St. John showed this totally in the interplay with our Lord when He came to John for baptism.  John spoke of his unworthiness to baptize the Lord.  Jesus instructed him to let it be for now to fulfill all righteousness.  And John obeyed!

We’ve not touched on fasting, or his manner of living.  We haven’t even mentioned Herod, and yet we’ve filled a page with accounts pointing to the worthiness of the Forerunner to be called the greatest born of woman.  St. John—intercede before the Lord for our souls!